Archive for April, 2009

The American Media have read their copies of Mein Kampf, underlined key passages, and put them to use in their propaganda.

Recently the media, the pundits, the late show comics, and prominent Democrats – including the Teleprompter of the United States – have repeatedly advanced the completely false charge that “90 percent of the guns that are picked up in Mexico and used to shoot judges, police officers and mayors … come from the United States.” It’s a complete lie. A lie that Democrats have tried to use for political effect.

In reality, the overwhelming majority of guns confiscated from drug cartels come from foreign countries, or from Mexico itself. Of the small percentage that had serial numbers submitted to the United States, 90% OF THOSE GUNS came from the U.S. And those guns were legal handguns, rifles, and shotguns – NOT assault rifles [WHY would drug cartels want semi-automatic “assault weapons” from the U.S. when they could buy the full-auto real deal somewhere else?]

Now we learn about another massive lie that liberals have used to great political effect:

The New York Times reported last week that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the alleged mastermind of the Sept. 11 terror attacks, was waterboarded 183 times in one month by CIA interrogators. The “183 times” was widely circulated by news outlets throughout the world.

It was shocking. And it was highly misleading. The number is a vast inflation, according to information from a U.S. official and the testimony of the terrorists themselves.

A U.S. official with knowledge of the interrogation program told FOX News that the much-cited figure represents the number of times water was poured onto Mohammed’s face — not the number of times the CIA applied the simulated-drowning technique on the terror suspect. According to a 2007 Red Cross report, he was subjected a total of “five sessions of ill-treatment.”

“The water was poured 183 times — there were 183 pours,” the official explained, adding that “each pour was a matter of seconds.” […]

The confusion stems from language in the Justice Department legal memos that President Obama released on April 16. They contain the numbers, but they fail to explain exactly what they represent. […]

Pours, not waterboards.

A close look at a Red Cross report on the interrogations makes the numbers even clearer.

As the Red Cross noted: “The suffocation procedure was applied [to Abu Zubaydah] during five sessions of ill-treatment … in 2002. During each session, apart from one, the suffocation technique was applied once or twice; on one occasion it was applied three times.”

The total number of applications: between eight and 10 — not the 83 mentioned in the Times.

Mohammed similarly told the Red Cross that “I was also subjected to ‘water-boarding’ on five occasions, all of which occurred during the first month.” Those were his five “sessions”; the precise number of applications is not known but is a fraction of the 183 figure.

All of those individual pours were scrupulously counted by the CIA, according to the memos, to abide by the procedures set up for the waterboardings.

“[I]t is important that every application of the waterboard be thoroughly documented: how long each application (and the entire procedure) lasted, how much water was used in the process,” read a memo from May 10, 2005. […]

The media picked up this distortion and – for their own ideological purposes – ran with it rather than fact check it. Ordinary bloggers realized that the numbers simply didn’t add up:

Bloggers who read the memos last week noted that the CIA’s math “doesn’t add up” … and they could barely even guess how the detainees could have been waterboarded an astounding 286 times in one month.

Are we seriously supposed to believe that these cynical, hardened professional journalists had absolutely no idea that something was desperately wrong with what they were reporting?

The media – and the Obama administration – deliberately perpetuated falsehoods because they wanted to convey two false “truths”: 1) the waterboarding of two terror suspects (266 times!!!) “clearly” constituted torture. And 2) the waterboarding technique “obviously” had no effect since it had to be used so many times.

There’s something very troubling. President Obama deliberately released confusing memos, made absolutely no effort to clarify to the American people what those memos actually meant, and then refused to provide any more information that would have put those carefully selected memos into context. It was all a giant lie.

In other words, the CIA under Bush learned 60% of everything they gathered on al Qaeda by basically waterboarding. And Barack Obama has just left the US intelligence community more than half blind as a result of his naive, politically correct moralizing hypocrisy.

But the propagandists of both the Obama administration and the media didn’t want us to know this; what they wanted us to “know” was the LIE that terror suspects were waterboarded 266 times.

They want the story to be about “Who practiced torture, and who is pledging to restore American virtue?” rather than, “Who kept us safe, and who is going to place this country at terrible risk?”

“All this was inspired by the principle – which is quite true in itself – that in the big lie there is always a certain force of credibility; because the broad masses of a nation are always more easily corrupted in the deeper strata of their emotional nature than consciously or voluntarily; and thus in the primitive simplicity of their minds they more readily fall victims to the big lie than the small lie, since they themselves often tell small lies in little matters but would be ashamed to resort to large-scale falsehoods. It would never come into their heads to fabricate colossal untruths, and they would not believe that others could have the impudence to distort the truth so infamously. Even though the facts which prove this to be so may be brought clearly to their minds, they will still doubt and waver and will continue to think that there may be some other explanation. For the grossly impudent lie always leaves traces behind it, even after it has been nailed down, a fact which is known to all expert liars in this world and to all who conspire together in the art of lying. These people know only too well how to use falsehood for the basest purposes.”

Hitler’s minister of propaganda, Joseph Goebbels, summarized Hitler’s “big lie” theory, saying that if a lie is repeated enough times it would become widely accepted as truth.

This is exactly what the Obama administration and the ideological leftwing mainstream media (both in the “news” and in the opinion-shaping late night programs) have repeatedly been doing.

Mark Twain famously said,

“A lie can be half-way round the world before the truth has got its boots on.”

And this story that these two suspects were repeatedly, tortuously waterboarded 266 times is now all over the world, thanks to our Liar-in-Chief and his Joseph Goebbels minions.

And Hitler said,

For the grossly impudent lie always leaves traces behind it, even after it has been nailed down, a fact which is known to all expert liars in this world and to all who conspire together in the art of lying.

Our professional liars – who call themselves “journalists” – understand that, and know that their lies will continue to wield impact even long after they are demonstrated to have been false all along.

Barack Obama, his Democrat lackeys, and the mainstream media, are FAR more evil in deliberately misrepresenting the truth for political partisan purposes than the Bush officials and the CIA interrogators who tried to keep this country safe after it suffered its worst attack in history.

Elaine: What else did you tell [reaches over to slap Jerry] him. [does it

again] The two of you must have had *quite* a little chat!

Jerry: Oh, it wasn’t like that! I didn’t even mention you. You know, we

were in the garage. You know how garages are. They’re conducive to sex

talk. It’s a high-testosterone area.

Elaine: Because of all the pistons and the lube jobs?

Jerry: Well, I’m going down to that garage and telling him to stop doing it.

Elaine: Well, wait—wait a second.

Jerry: What?

Elaine: Isn’t that a little…rash?

Jerry: No! He stole my move!

Elaine: Yeah, but…*I* like the move.

Jerry: Yeah, but it’s like another comedian stealing my material.

Elaine: Well, he doesn’t even do it exactly the same. He–he–he uses a

pinch at the end instead of the *swirl*!

Jerry: Oh, yeah. The pinch. *I’ve* done the pinch. That’s not new.

Well, with that that long bit of introduction, the Democrats have their very own “move,” – an extremely potent and successful “move” – and they are clearly angry that Republicans are beginning to steal their move.

The Democrat’s “move” – by the way – is demonization. It’s their move, they’ve used it to great effect for the last twenty years or so, and they don’t want their rivals using it.

It Takes One to Know One
“Harvard Law professor Mary Ann Glendon, one of the most prominent Catholic conservative intellectuals in the United States, announced yesterday that she would refuse a prestigious award from the University of Notre Dame rather than appear on the same platform on which President Obama is being awarded an honorary degree,” the Boston Globe reports.

The Globe notes that not all Catholics are unhappy with Notre Dame’s plan to give the president an honorary degree:

“There are some well-meaning people who think Notre Dame has given away its Catholic identity, because they have been caught up in the gamesmanship of American higher education, bringing in a star commencement speaker even if that means sacrificing their values, and that accounts for some of this,” said the Rev. Kenneth Himes, chairman of theology department at Boston College. “But one also has to say that there is a political game going on here, and part of that is that you demonize the people who disagree with you, you question their integrity, you challenge their character, and you brand these people as moral poison. Some people have simply reduced Catholicism to the abortion issue, and, consequently, they have simply launched a crusade to bar anything from Catholic institutions that smacks of any sort of open conversation.”

Nearly 100 faculty members at Boston College have signed a letter objecting to the college’s decision to award Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice an honorary degree.

The letter entitled “Condoleezza Rice Does Not Deserve a Boston College Honorary Degree,” was written by the Rev. Kenneth Himes. . . .

“On the levels of both moral principle and practical moral judgment, Secretary Rice’s approach to international affairs is in fundamental conflict with Boston College’s commitment to the values of the Catholic and Jesuit traditions and is inconsistent with the humanistic values that inspire the university’s work,” the letter said.

Himes, it seems, is an expert on demonization.

Kenneth Himes lectures us: How DARE you do what I did to you! There must be something morally WRONG with you!!! Demonization is “OUR” move, and you can’t steal it!

Well, as Obama folk like to say, “YES, WE CAN!”

Being a liberal means being a hypocrite. Hypocrisy defines liberals; their shriveled little souls swim in it. And part of being a total hypocrite means having the pathological ability to be perfectly at home with their own massive contradictions.

For instance, liberals are “tolerant,” which means they lash out and demonize anyone who doesn’t think exactly like them – in the name of “tolerance.”

A few other examples of liberal hypocrisy:

Liberals support high taxes on the rich. As long as it is understood that they have no expectation to pay such taxes themselves. Ask pretty much anyone on Barack Obama’s cabinet. Liberals like “Turbo Tax” Tim Geithner, Tom Daschle, Bill Richardson, Ron Kirk, Hilda Solis, Nancy Kelleher, and Kathleen Sebelius. And that doesn’t include Congressional Democrats such as Charles Rangel – who is writing YOUR tax laws even as he cheats on HIS taxes. And don’t forget the mantra from Rangel’s former fellow member of the House Ways and Means Committee William Jefferson: “FBI sting money hidden in freezers is NOT taxable.”

Liberals claim that it is the rich’s “patriotic duty” to pay a shockingly high percentage of total income taxes while simultaneously pandering to the clearly unpatriotic – by their own standard – 42% of Americans who pay NO federal income taxes at all.

Liberals love racial diversity – as long as they can continue demonizing black conservatives such as Michael Steele, Clarence Thomas, and Condoleezza Rice as “Uncle Toms and Aunt Jemimahs” or “race traitors.” Janeane Garafalo is completely free to be a hard-core racist, just as long as the minorities she viciously attacks are conservatives. Newsweek Magazine – in wholehearted agreement with Garafalo – literally argued that whites who don’t vote for Obama are racist.

Liberals stand for the helpless and oppressed victim: as long as that helpless and oppressed victim isn’t a baby having his brains sucked out. Meanwhile liberals attack conservatives as not caring about the poor, even though – as has already been pointed out – conservatives are in fact FAR more generous than liberals (example 1, example 2).

Liberals continually decry the “rightwing smear machine” even as they have hard-core hate sites such as Moveon.org, Media Matters, and the Daily Kos – which DWARF anything even remotely compatible on the right. The primary funding comes from documented Nazi collaborator George Soros, an American-sovereignty-undermining trans-nationalist who has made his billions undermining currencies all over the world – including America’s. And his friends have been just as bad. And Soros and friends such as Peter Lewis, Steven Bing, and Herbert and Marion Sandler have used their massive fortunes to ensure that NOBODY smears like the left: think “General Betray Us.”

Liberals “interpret” the Constitution to find “penumbras and emanations” that they allege mandate a constitutional and sacred right to abortion on demand, but twist and contort the English language until the 2nd Amendment doesn’t give the people the right to bear arms.

Liberals demand socialized medicine. Michael Moore made a ton of money demonizing America’s privatized system and claiming that Cuba’s socialized medicine was better; yet when that fat SOB needed heart surgery, he elected to go to Cleveland rather than Cuba. Even more glaring, Belinda Stronach of the Canadian Parliament opposed even allowing private medicine in Canada; but when she was diagnosed with breast cancer she came to the United States to obtain the very thing she denied her fellow citizens from having.

As to the death penalty for convicted murderers, liberals argue that inserting a hypodermic needle into the vein of a death row inmate constitutes cruel and unusual punishment, yet insist that sucking the brains out of a viable baby whose head is sticking out of a birth canal is compassionate.

They also say that a 13 year old girl should be able to have an abortion without her parents’ consent, then tell parents that they face jail if they don’t ensure that that same 13 year old girl doesn’t miss school (with attendance being the barometer for public school funding).

As for liberals’ view on patriotism, sometimes a picture is worth a thousand words – when that picture is a cartoon drawn by Ted Rall:

Let’s see: racial hatred directed at white males. Check. Cynicism of the patriotism that would make a young man fight for his country. Check. Mockery of religion. Check. Contempt for America as a country of suicide bombers. Check.

Or another liberal cartoon. America as viewed through the warped lenses of the liberal New York Times: the Statue of Liberty swinging a whip at the poor, tired, huddled masses.

As liberals now demand that conservatives stop using “their move,” realize that they will NEVER stop using it themselves. It is simply who they are. So we might as well sick their own dog on them – and let us make sure that dog is foaming at the mouth when it bites them back.

We are beginning to learn that $12.8 trillion doesn’t last very long when it is being spent by corrupt politicians and idiot bureaucrats. It doesn’t seem to matter how much Obama has already spent or committed; he just has to keep spending more and more and more.

WASHINGTON – The Treasury Department said Monday it will need to borrow $361 billion in the current April-June quarter, a record amount for that period.

It’s the third straight quarter the government’s borrowing needs have set records for those periods.

Treasury also estimated it will need to borrow $515 billion in the July-September quarter, down slightly from the $530 billion borrowed during the year-ago period. The all-time high of $569 billion was set in the October-December period.

The huge borrowing needs reflect the soaring costs of the $700 billion financial rescue program and the recession, which is nearing a record as the longest in the post World War II period.

The slump has cut sharply into tax revenue and boosted government spending for benefit programs such as unemployment insurance and food stamps.

The administration is projecting the federal deficit for the entire budget year ending Sept. 30, will total a record $1.75 trillion. A deficit at that level would nearly quadruple the previous record of $454.8 billion set last year.

To cover the government’s heavy borrowing needs, Congress in February boosted the limit for the national debt to $12.1 trillion as part of the legislation that enacted President Barack Obama‘s $787 billion economic stimulus program. The national debt now stands at $11.1 trillion.

Not the first time we’ve seen insane spending, as a 1934 Chicago Tribune cartoon would illustrate:

But FDR never dreamed of the MEGO numbers (“My Eyes Glaze Over”) that we are facing today.

What is it those little notes on the out-of-control wagon say?

“Depleting the resources of the soundest government in the world.”

“Spend! Spend! Spend – Under the guise of recovery. Bust the government – blame the capitalists for the failure – junk the Constitution and decree a dictatorship. “

And the figure of Stalin says, “How red the sunrise is getting,” to denote the communist mindset that such levels of government spending and control over the economy entails.

The Tribune cartoon was drawn in 1934. The Great Depression – in testament to the folly the artist was pointing out – would continue to drag on for years afterward. FDR’s “solutions” didn’t solve the crisis; they prolonged the suffering.

Michael Boskin described the radical extent of the Obama socialist spending in The Wall Street Journal (the newspaper people are actually willing to buy):

It’s hard not to see the continued sell-off on Wall Street and the growing fear on Main Street as a product, at least in part, of the realization that our new president’s policies are designed to radically re-engineer the market-based U.S. economy, not just mitigate the recession and financial crisis.

The illusion that Barack Obama will lead from the economic center has quickly come to an end. Instead of combining the best policies of past Democratic presidents — John Kennedy on taxes, Bill Clinton on welfare reform and a balanced budget, for instance — President Obama is returning to Jimmy Carter’s higher taxes and Mr. Clinton’s draconian defense drawdown.

Mr. Obama’s $3.6 trillion budget blueprint, by his own admission, redefines the role of government in our economy and society. The budget more than doubles the national debt held by the public, adding more to the debt than all previous presidents — from George Washington to George W. Bush — combined. It reduces defense spending to a level not sustained since the dangerous days before World War II, while increasing nondefense spending (relative to GDP) to the highest level in U.S. history. And it would raise taxes to historically high levels (again, relative to GDP). And all of this before addressing the impending explosion in Social Security and Medicare costs.

Many liberals stubbornly cling to the thesis that FDR’s policies brought America out of the Great Depression. And they can cite a boatload of leftist historians who have come to precisely that conclusion.

But I would submit that anyone taking that position must refute Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s VERY OWN TREASURY SECRETARY.

“We have tried spending money. We are spending more than we have ever spent before and it does not work. And I have just one interest, and if I am wrong… somebody else can have my job. I want to see this country prosperous. I want to see people get a job. I want to see people get enough to eat. We have never made good on our promises… I say after eight years of this Administration we have just as much unemployment as when we started… And an enormous debt to boot!” – Henry Morgenthau, FDR’s Treasury Secretary, May 9, 1939

We are spending FAR TOO MUCH MONEY, and we’re spending it on the wrong things. We are repeating the worst mistakes of the Great Depression, and are very likely doomed to repeat the consequences of our failure to learn the lessons of history.

The fact of the matter is that ignoring defense spending was a hallmark of FDR, too. In spite of the growing and building threat of both the Nazis and the Japanese Imperialists for YEARS, FDR spent massively on virtually everything BUT defense spending. Which is why we were so woefully unprepared for hostilities following the Pearl Harbor sneak attack that inexcusably caught us completely off guard.

Getting back to Reagan, one is forced to only imagine how many American lives would have been saved if we’d had a Reagan rather than a socialist-spending FDR serving as President; and we’d gone into World War II with the mightiest military machine in the world rather than with the 2nd rate joke we were forced to begin with.

And thanks to Obama’s massive defense cuts one may be forced to wonder about how many lives we could have saved all over again as he slashes our military rather

In many ways, FDR and BHO are images of one another. Both men were skilled politicians with great oratorical skills (providing Obama has a teleprompter, anyway). Both men had never had a single success of their own in business. And both had the completely wrong idea of what was wrong with the national economy, and what needed to be done to get it back on track.

The one difference is this: FDR foolishly caused America to REMAIN in the Great Depression by zealously pursuing failed policies; BHO will foolishly force America INTO the next Great Depression by zealously pursuing the SAME failed policies that never worked for FDR.

“I now find my political philosophy more in line with Democrats than Republicans.”

Does anyone seriously think that the Republican Party became more conservative since those halcion days when that liberal progressive Ronald Reagan was president, or when that leftist Newt Gingrich pushed through the contract with America?

Stop and remember: George Bush pushed the liberal “No Child Left Behind” with Ted Kennedy. George Bush pushed the enormous and costly Medicare prescription drug social program. George Bush tried to push amnesty for illegal immigrants with Democrats. How incredibly rightwing of him.

Arlen Specter would literally have us believe that he’s switching parties because he thinks Barack Obama represents 1980s Reagan values than the Republicans who have tried to stand against the liberal socialist agenda do.

Specter said, “my Party has not defined who I am.” And this Republican-In-Name-Only is entirely accurate. It hasn’t. What is best for Arlen Specter defines who he is. Whatever gets him elected.

This is about one thing, and one thing only: Arlen Specter’s reelection. Specter looked at the poll numbers, and realized he would not survive a primary challenge. And so the man who had called upon Republicans to vote for him for decades showed his naked contempt for Pennsylvanian Republicans.

It has become clear to me that the stimulus vote caused a schism which makes our differences irreconcilable. On this state of the record, I am unwilling to have my twenty-nine year Senate record judged by the Pennsylvania Republican primary electorate. I have not represented the Republican Party. I have represented the people of Pennsylvania.

You’ve represented yourself, Arlen. You would vote with the devil if the devil helped you win your next campaign.

How should these issues be handled by the Senate for the future? I intend to propose a rule change which would preclude a future recurrence of a Senator’s change in parties, in mid-session, organizing with the opposition, to cause the upheaval which is now resulting.

I take second place to no one on independence voting. But, it is my view that the organizational vote belongs to the party which supported the election of a particular Senator. I believe that is the expectation. And certainly it has been a very abrupt party change, although they have occurred in the past with only minor ripples, none have caused the major dislocation which this one has.

Specter said this about previously Republican Senator Jim Jeffords’ decision to switch to independent. Specter is going ALL the way to the dark side of the Democrat Party, which is far worse than Jeffords’ crime. And given the filibuster-proof balance that is now at issue, Specter will cause a far WORSE “major dislocation” with his move.

Arlen Specter is a hypocrite by his own standard. He is a self-serving panderer who stands for no one and nothing beyond his own political survival. He is the quintessential example of the sort of politician in BOTH parties who corrupt and degrade the American political process.

If Arlen Specter represents the character of the people opposing conservative principles, let us recognize that fact. Arlen Specter lacked the moral and ethical character to garner the support of conservatives, and so he joined the party which best represents his lack thereof.

Will Arlen Specter hold his seat as a turncoat? I can only say that any state that is contemptible enough to re-elect John Murtha is contemptible enough to re-elect anyone. I frankly don’t give a damn what Pennsylvania does if they’re going to support such scumbags.

It is very likely that Democrats will have their filibuster-proof majority, and have the numbers to push through a lot of awful legislation. In my humble opinion, the task of conservatives (and hopefully Republicans) is to unite around conservative values and ideas, and have the courage and integrity – unlike the Arlen Specters of the world – to continue to support those values and ideas come what may.

Ultimately Obama and his fellow socialists will hang themselves by their own excesses and failures. It is our job to ensure that they are forced to wear their own albatross around their necks.

After Obama responded that it would, Wurzelbacher continued: “I’ve worked hard . . . I work 10 to 12 hours a day and I’m buying this company and I’m going to continue working that way. I’m getting taxed more and more while fulfilling the American Dream.”

“It’s not that I want to punish your success,” Obama told him. “I want to make sure that everybody who is behind you, that they’ve got a chance for success, too.

Then, Obama explained his trickle-up theory of economics.

“My attitude is that if the economy’s good for folks from the bottom up, it’s gonna be good for everybody. I think when you spread the wealth around, it’s good for everybody.”

“The answer is clearly no, Senator Obama is not a socialist,” said Paul Beck, a professor of political science at Ohio State University. “We’ve had a progressive tax system for some time, and both Republicans and Democrats have bought into it.”

Socialism involves state ownership of the means of economic production and state-directed sharing of the wealth. America’s democratic capitalist system is neither socialist nor pure free market; rather, it mixes the two, and it has at least since the progressive income tax was introduced 95 years ago. Under it, the wealthy pay higher income tax rates than those who are less fortunate do. It’s a form of sharing the wealth.”

Now, of course, I read that last paragraph and I’m just rolling on the floor laughing at how ignorant and dishonest these liberals were – and are.

“Let’s move it along, folks. Move it along. No socialists to see here.”

Sorry, mainstream media: Obama is as socialist as the sun is hot. The fact that you were too blatantly dishonest and corrupt and incompetent to do your job during the campaign is just one more case in point that we are now under the thrall of totalitarian propaganda.

As the February 16, 2009 issue of Newseek gleefully trumpeted:

That pretty much makes it official: Obama and the Democratic Party lied to us: they were socialists all along, and too dishonest and too corrupt to honestly and legitimately represent themselves.

I also have to point out the fact that the VERY WORST ELEMENTS OF SOCIALISM – right out of the playbook of the “National Socialist German Workers’ Party” or the “Union of Soviet Socialist Republics” – were used to attack Joe Wurzelbacher simply for asking a candidate for president a couple of questions right outside his house. The media and the Democrat machine went after him with everything they had, including snooping through his private records in a very KGB-like manner in hopes of dredging up dirt on him.

Gail Johnson doesn’t think of herself as wealthy. The former pediatric nurse has spent 20 years building a chain of preschools and after-school programs that accommodate sick children so working parents can keep their jobs.

But, like most small-business owners, Johnson reports her profit on her personal tax return. In a typical year, she and her husband make more than $500,000, according to her accountant, a figure that throws them squarely into the ranks of the richest Americans — and makes them a prime target for the Obama administration’s tax policy.

Since last year’s campaign, President Obama has vowed repeatedly not to increase taxes for families making less than $250,000 a year. That pledge, while politically popular, has left him with just two primary sources of funding for his ambitious social agenda: about 3 million high-earning families and the nation’s businesses.

Johnson, with her company, falls into both categories. If Obama’s tax plans are enacted, her accountant estimates that her federal tax bill — typically, around $120,000 a year — would rise by at least $23,000, a 19 percent increase.

“You hear ‘tax the rich,’ and you think, ‘I don’t make that much money,’ ” said Johnson, whose Rainbow Station programs are headquartered near Richmond. “But then you realize: ‘Oh, if I put my business income with my wages, then, suddenly, I’m there.’ ”

Across the nation, many business owners are watching anxiously as the president undertakes expensive initiatives to overhaul health care and expand educational opportunities, while also reining in runaway budget deficits. Already, Obama has proposed an extra $1.3 trillion in taxes for business and high earners over the next decade. They include new limits on the ability of corporations to automatically defer U.S. taxes on income earned overseas, repeal of a form of inventory accounting that tends to reduce business taxes, and a mandate that investment partnerships pay the regular income tax rate instead of the lower capital gains rate.

‘A Permanent Target’
Business groups say they’re bracing for even more battles with the administration.

“They’re desperate for revenue. And therein lies the concern of the broader business community,” said R. Bruce Josten, chief lobbyist for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

“We’re going to be a permanent target, and we understand that,” added Catherine Schultz, vice president for tax policy at the National Foreign Trade Council. “The way they see it, corporations don’t vote.”

Many small business owners file individual income tax returns. Their “incomes” do not merely go into their pockets; rather, they use their profits to pay their employees and reinvest in their businesses:

Johnson declined to say whether she voted for Obama. But she said she ignored his tax plans until her husband, who handles real estate and construction for the schools, mentioned it one day. “I’ve since talked to my accountant,” she said. “And, oh, my gosh!”

The accountant, Carroll Hurst, said Johnson is unlikely to owe any federal taxes this year due to accounting changes that confer a one-time tax benefit. But in a typical year, he said, Johnson and her husband earn about $515,000 from various entities related to the schools. They claim around $90,000 in deductions — much of it contributions to charity — reducing their taxable income to around $425,000. Johnson said the sum they take home in wages is “substantially less.”

In a typical year, Johnson’s federal tax bill would be about $120,000. But starting in 2011, the higher marginal rates would add about $13,000 a year, Hurst said. Capping the value of itemized deductions at 28 percent would add another $10,000, for a total increase of $23,000.

And Johnson’s tax bill stands to grow dramatically if Obama were to revive a plan to apply Social Security tax to income over $250,000 instead of capping it at the current $106,800. Because Johnson is an employee and an employer, she would have to pay both portions of the tax, Hurst said, tacking another $30,000 onto her bill.

Johnson said such an increase would force her to consider scaling back operations.

“You can try to pass it on to consumers. But if you raise tuition, you put pressure on family budgets,” she said. “For us, we’re caught between the devil and the deep blue sea.”

Other business owners are also nervous. Jim Murphy, president of EST Analytical in Fairfield, Ohio, which sells analytical instruments to environmental testing labs and pharmaceuticals, said his company is struggling in the sluggish economy. But if profit returns to pre-recession levels — about $455,000 — Murphy said his accountant estimates that Obama’s proposals could add $60,000 to his $120,000 tax bill.

“The misconception is that guys like me take [our profits] and put it into our pockets,” said Murphy, who employs 47 people. “But the money the company earns in a given year is used to buy additional inventory so we can grow and hire.” A 50 percent tax increase, he said, would be “really painful.”

So let’s review the basic facts: Barack Obama IS a socialist, just as Joe the Plumber intuitively understood even as liberal “intellectuals” loudly howled with all the outrage they could muster. There’s no question of that fact any longer. In fact, he is essentially a fascist, just as progressives such as Woodrow Wilson and even FDR were before him. And Obama IS coming after small businesses and their owners, just as Joe the Plumber rightly feared. And, furthermore, the Obama White House and the mainstream media alike will apply any tactic to attack and demonize their opponents for political purposes just like the worst socialist regimes in world history.

Today terror struck thousands of New Yorkers. A large passenger jet, taking much the same route that terrorist hijackers used to strike the twin towers of the World Trade Center on 9/11, flew over them at extremely low altitude.

Updated, 5:52 p.m. | An Air Force One lookalike, the backup plane for the one regularly used by the president, flew low over parts of New York and New Jersey on Monday morning, accompanied by two F-16 fighters, so Air Force photographers could take pictures high above the New York harbor.

But the exercise — conducted without any notification to the public — caused momentary panic in some quarters and led to the evacuation of several buildings in Lower Manhattan and Jersey City. By the afternoon, the situation had turned into a political fuse box, with Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg saying that he was “furious” that he had not been told in advance about the flyover.

At 4:39 p.m. Monday, the White House issued an apology for the flyover.

This is a mindset of “Grecian columns”-style arrogance. You can almost hear the words, “So let it be written. So let it be done” uttered with all the self-worshiping imperiousness of Yul Brynner as Pharaoh.

And of course, we learn:

When President Obama learned of the episode on Monday afternoon, aides said, he, too, was furious. Senior administration officials conveyed the president’s anger in a meeting with Mr. Caldera on Monday afternoon.

So resign, Barry. You’ve blamed George Bush for everything that happened under his administration and then continued to blame him for everything that has happened in yours. Take a little responsibility for your own damn mess for once in your life. This is YOUR team screwing up, and using YOUR damn plane to do it. Is this fiasco supposed to be Bush’s fault, too?

Some in the crowd were undoubtedly terrified of a terrorist attack because they didn’t know that it was actually Air Force One flying around for a photo op. But I wonder how many Americans looked up and saw Barry Hussein’s jet barreling down on them and thought, “I knew it!”

This IS the guy who just released memos showing terrorists how to resist future interrogations, after all.

Now, one thing this incident shows is Obama’s blatant hypocrisy. His administration could have easily photoshopped Obama’s fancy new jet against the Manhattan skyline, and nobody would have been the wiser. But no. Instead, the people who perennially lecture the rest of us on energy consumption and greenhouse gasses spend several hundred thousand dollars on jet fuel that dumped dozens of tons of greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere for a stupid photo op. Kind of like the one Obama took when he flew to Iowa so he could stand in front of a damn windmill on earth day.

Apparently, the worst thing that can happen to our environment is for Barack Obama and Al Gore to preach about the threat of global warming doing their version of “the midnight ride of Paul Revere” from carbon-spewing jets.

Keep that in mind the next time you hear a finger-wagging lecture. Make Obama buy his own damn cap-and-trade carbon credits. With his own damn money.

But, far more, this is a case study in a PRE-9/11 mentality. Nobody at the Obama White House is thinking about a terror attack. It won’t happen; no one would DARE attack the messiah’s country, after all. The world is wonderful again because that evil Bush is gone and Obama is leading the world into freedom and happiness. So we can bare our collective throats knowing that the terrorists would NEVER saw our heads off while Obama is president.

I think it is safe to say that absolutely nobody in their right mind would even contemplate flying a passenger jet at low altitude over New York if they were even remotely thinking about 9/11.

I guess the administration had ONE thing right with all its politically correct euphemisms: Obama’s fly-by wasn’t a “terrorist attack”; it was a “man-caused disaster.”

Game, set, and match to the Statists and the big labor agenda. From this point forward, the government will be deciding what cars are made, and the unions will literally be negotiating with themselves to determine how much they’ll earn making them.

The government was able to buy it’s way into total control of the auto industry for only a few billion dollars. A tremendous day for Statism, a dark day indeed for the free market and for individual liberty.

DETROIT – General Motors Corp. could be majority owned by the federal government under a massive restructuring plan laid out Monday that will cut 21,000 U.S. factory jobs by next year and phase out the storied Pontiac brand.

The plan, which includes an offer to swap roughly $27 billion in bond debt for GM stock, would leave current shareholders holding just 1 percent of the century-old company, which is fighting for its life in the worst auto sales climate in 27 years.

GM is living on $15.4 billion in government loans and said Monday in a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission that it envisions receiving an additional $11.6 billion.…

GM said that it will ask the government to take more than 50 percent of its common stock in exchange for canceling half the government loans to the company as of June 1. The swap would cancel about $10 billion in government debt.

In addition, GM is offering stock to the United Auto Workers for at least 50 percent of the $20 billion the company must pay into a union run trust that will take over retiree health care expenses starting next year.

If both are successful, the government and UAW health care trust would own 89 percent of GM stock, with the government holding more than a 50 percent stake, CEO Fritz Henderson said in a news conference at GM’s Detroit headquarters.

Henderson said that although the government would own a majority of GM’s outstanding common shares, the Treasury “hasn’t demonstrated interest in running the company,” but would have someone on the board looking out for the taxpayers’ interest. The task force has directed current board chairman Kent Kresa to replace several board members.

This is about as blatant of a case of simultaneously talking out of both sides of one’s mouth as there is. The government has no interest in running GM; they just want to be able to fire the company’s GM and have the power to decide who is on the board of directors. You’ve got to give the Obama administration points for sheer chutzpah. And millions of political cuckolds are literally choosing to believe him rather than trusting their own lying eyes.

There’s a story entitled, “The Devil and Daniel Webster” that describes what can happen when one foolishly makes a deal with the devil. Unfortunately, the Jabez Stone stand-in (GM) won’t have any Daniel Websters to confound Mr Scratch (brilliantly depicted by Barrack Hussein). The lesson of this story is that it’s bad enough to do a deal with the devil; but never, NEVER, NEVER do a deal with the government. You can’t win, and you won’t even be able to lose with dignity.

“The shareholders, the VEBA (health care trust) and the government would want to have a someone on the board of directors,” he said.

Deals with the UAW and the Treasury have yet to be finalized, he said.

The struggling automaker said it will offer 225 shares of common stock for every $1,000 in notes held by bondholders as part of a debt-for-equity swap. Henderson said the objective is to reduce GM’s $27 billion of outstanding public debt by about $24 billion. The company estimates that after the exchange, bondholders would own 10 percent of the company.

That would leave current common stockholders with only 1 percent, GM said. Still, GM shares rose 34 cents, or 21 percent, to $2.03 in midday trading.

The plans, if successful, would reduce GM’s debt by $44 billion from the present figure of about $62.4 billion.

“We would be substantially less-leveraged as a company,” Henderson said.

Kip Penniman Jr., an analyst with KDP Investment Advisors Inc., predicted the exchange offer would fail and GM will file for bankruptcy….

The company also said it plans to reduce its dealership ranks by 42 percent from 2008 to 2010, cutting them from 6,246 to 3,605. When asked how GM would accomplish that, Henderson would say only that the company would be making offers to the dealers in the coming weeks.

Mark LaNeve, vice president of North American sales and marketing, said a big chunk of the dealership reduction — about 450 — would come with the elimination or sale of Saturn, Hummer and Saab. GM would then look to end relationships with dealers that do only a small volume of business with GM, and then move on to other dealers, he said….

The dealer closings are not included in the job loss numbers sited at the beginning of this article, which will easily add well over one hundred thousand more jobs to the low-ball total cited at the beginning of the article.

The same government that couldn’t run a cafeteria without going millions of dollars into the red; the same government that still can’t run a successful post office in spite of the numerous successful businesses that have sprung up all around it; the same government whose model for successful customer service is the Department of Motor Vehicles, is going to be teaming up with the very unions who ran the auto manufacturing industry out of business in the first place to build cars.

On April 17, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) issued an endangerment finding, saying that global warming poses a serious threat to public health and safety. Thus, almost anything that emits carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases could be regulated under the Clean Air Act. This is the first official action taken by the federal government to regulate carbon dioxide.

The endangerment finding is the initial step in a long regulatory process that could lead to the EPA requiring regulations for almost anything that emits carbon dioxide. Automobiles would likely be the first target, but subsequent regulations could extend to a million or more buildings and small businesses, including hospitals, schools, restaurants, churches, farms, and apartments. The following five reasons explain why this would be a big, costly mistake.

1. It’s an Economy Killer

Above anything else, any attempt to reduce carbon dioxide would be poison to an already sick economy. Even when the economy does recover, the EPA’s proposed global warming policy would severely limit economic growth.

Since 85 percent of the U.S. economy runs on fossil fuels that emit carbon dioxide, imposing a cost on CO2 is equivalent to placing an economy-wide tax on energy use. The Heritage Foundation’s Center for Data Analysis study of the economic effects of carbon dioxide cuts found cumulative gross domestic product (GDP) losses of $7 trillion by 2029 (in inflation-adjusted 2008 dollars), single-year GDP losses exceeding $600 billion in some years (in inflation-adjusted 2008 dollars), energy cost increases of 30 percent or more, and annual job losses exceeding 800,000 for several years. Hit particularly hard is manufacturing, which will see job losses in some industries that exceed 50 percent.[1]

High energy costs result in production cuts, reduced consumer spending, increased unemployment, and ultimately a much slower economy. But importantly, higher energy prices fall disproportionately on the poor, since low-income households spend a larger percentage of their income on energy.

2. Negligible Environmental Benefit

The extraordinary perils of CO2 regulation for the American economy come with little, if any, environmental benefit. In fact, analysis by the architects of the endangerment finding, the EPA, strongly suggests that a 60 percent reduction in carbon-dioxide emissions by 2050 will reduce global temperature by 0.1 to 0.2 degrees Celsius by 2095.[2]

Some environmental alarmists believe saving the environment should come at any cost, but when the benefit is barely noticeable, such an extreme viewpoint still cannot be justified.

3. Lack of Scientific Consensus

The decision to regulate carbon dioxide and five other greenhouse gases was supported by supposed compelling scientific evidence. For example, EPA administrator Lisa Jackson “relied heavily upon the major findings and conclusions from recent assessments of the U.S. Climate Change Science Program and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change [IPPC].”[3] Additionally, the EPA cited harmful impacts including increased droughts, floods, wildfires, heat waves, and sea level rises as a result of climate change. But the reality is that natural disasters are just that–they occur with or without global warming.

The scientific consensus behind global warming, especially the seriousness of the impacts, is anything but strong. Last December, the U.S. Senate Minority released a report that included 650 dissenting scientists refuting claims made in the IPCC report.[4] That number has grown to over 700, more than 13 times the number of scientists (52) who had a direct role in the IPCC report.

4. Backdoor Policy

The United States Congress has been reluctant to pass any global warming legislation or engage in international climate reduction treaties. Last year’s most noted global warming legislative proposals was S. 2191, the America’s Climate Security Act of 2007, originally sponsored by Senators Joe Lieberman (I-CT) and John Warner (R-VA).

This cap-and-trade bill would have set a limit on the emissions of greenhouse gases, especially carbon dioxide from the combustion of coal, oil, and natural gas. A number of concerns existed, chief among them the impact on already-soaring gasoline prices, and consequently the bill was withdrawn by its Senate supporters after only three days of debate.

While some Members of Congress undoubtedly support the EPA’s attempt to curb global warming, the fact that unelected and unaccountable EPA bureaucrats are trying to bypass legislative efforts makes it all the more objectionable.

Equally indefensible is any attempt to use the threat of EPA regulations to induce Congress into enacting a cap-and-trade bill it would not support otherwise. Members should not be forced to prematurely pass a bill without fully understanding its effects and consequences.

5. Expanded Bureaucracy

Having EPA bureaucrats micromanage the economy, all in the name of combating global warming, would be a chilling shift to a command-and-control system in which EPA officials regulate just about every aspect of the market.

Beyond the costs of such actions, the red tape and permitting delays are almost unfathomable. Though the Administration recently enacted a stimulus bill and touted “shovel ready” construction projects to boost the economy, EPA regulations would essentially assure that a great deal of such economic activity would be held up for months, if not years.

For instance, the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) requires federal agencies to file environmental impact statements for EPA review before moving forward with projects. According to the Government Accountability Office, normally it takes a federal construction project an average of 4.4 years to complete a NEPA review. Along with the Clean Water Act’s Section 404 requirements, before a shovel can break ground, it could take 5.6 years for a project to jump through all the normal environmental hoops.[5] Granting the authority for one of the largest and unprecedented regulatory undertakings in U.S. history would greatly expand the EPA’s power.

The kind of industrial-strength EPA red tape that routinely imposes hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of dollars in compliance costs could now be imposed for the first time on many commercial buildings, farms, and all but the smallest of businesses. Not only would these costs and delays hamper the private sector, but the paperwork could paralyze federal and state environmental regulators, drawing resources away from more useful endeavors.

A Dangerous Step

The EPA’s official announcement commences a 60-day public comment[6] period before the agency issues a final ruling. Using the Clean Air Act to regulate CO2 would likely be the most expensive and expansive environmental regulation in history and will bypass the legislative process completely. In essence, the decisions of few will drastically alter the lives of many–all for a change in the Earth’s temperature too small to ever notice.

Ben Lieberman is Senior Policy Analyst in Energy and the Environment and Nicolas D. Loris is a Research Assistant in the Thomas A. Roe Institute for Economic Policy Studies at The Heritage Foundation.

Obama’s DNI reminds Obama that “enhanced interrogation” worked

posted at 8:44 am on April 22, 2009 by Ed Morrissey

Barack Obama’s top man in the intelligence community sent the President a memo defending the use of enhanced interrogation techniques, which the White House edited before releasing to the press de-emphasizing that defense. Dennis Blair, the Director of National Intelligence, pointed out that most of what we know about al-Qaeda came from using those techniques on Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and Abu Zubaydah, countering leaks last week from the Obama administration that claimed the methods produced no data:

President Obama’s national intelligence director told colleagues in a private memo last week that the harsh interrogation techniques banned by the White House did produce significant information that helped the nation in its struggle with terrorists.

“High value information came from interrogations in which those methods were used and provided a deeper understanding of the al Qa’ida organization that was attacking this country,” Adm. Dennis C. Blair, the intelligence director, wrote in a memo to his staff last Thursday.

Admiral Blair sent his memo on the same day the administration publicly released secret Bush administration legal memos authorizing the use of interrogation methods that the Obama White House has deemed to be illegal torture. Among other things, the Bush administration memos revealed that two captured Qaeda operatives were subjected to a form of near-drowning known as waterboarding a total of 266 times.

The New York Times, which got a copy of the memo, also notices some odd redactions from the version released by the White House:

Admiral Blair’s assessment that the interrogation methods did produce important information was deleted from a condensed version of his memo released to the media last Thursday. Also deleted was a line in which he empathized with his predecessors who originally approved some of the harsh tactics after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

“I like to think I would not have approved those methods in the past,” he wrote, “but I do not fault those who made the decisions at that time, and I will absolutely defend those who carried out the interrogations within the orders they were given.”

In other words, the Obama administration covered up the fact that even their own DNI acknowledges that the interrogations produced actionable and critical information. When Dick Cheney demanded the release of the rest of the memos relating that information, he wasn’t just going on a fishing expedition. Cheney filed a request to declassify those memos in March, and the CIA has yet to decide on his request, but we can no longer doubt that records exist showing the success of those interrogations.

Obama has occasionally suggested a truth-and-reconciliation approach to probing the use of torture by the Bush administration, but this establishes that Obama isn’t terribly interested in “truth”. Withholding the truth that waterboarding produced information that saved hundreds of American lives, perhaps thousands, shows that Obama values public relations more than he does the truth. He wants to argue that none of this was necessary to secure the nation against terrorist attacks. In order to make that argument, he redacted Blair’s memo, including his defense of his predecessors, whom Blair acknowledges had to face some tough decisions to uncover plots against America.

WASHINGTON – Four former CIA directors opposed releasing classified Bush-era interrogation memos, officials say, describing objections that went all the way to the White House and slowed release of the records.

Former CIA chiefs Michael Hayden, Porter Goss, George Tenet and John Deutch all called the White House in March warning that release of the so-called “torture memos” would compromise intelligence operations, current and former officials say. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity in order to detail internal government discussions.

Even Obama’s OWN CURRENT CIA director pulled back from releasing the memos, said administration needed to consider the possibility that the memos’ release might expose CIA officers to lawsuits on allegations of torture and abuse, and urged more censorship.

Obama now has a proven track record of releasing – in the name of “openness and accountability” – only that information which harms his opposition, while refusing to release and even censoring any mitigating information.

Wow. The most radically liberal Senator in Congress is breaking his promise to be bipartisan and above the political divide as a “new politician,” which was at the heart of his campaign. He is turning out to be the most divisive president in modern history. What can I say? I’m speechless with shock – that there were enough fools in the country who thought he’d turn out any differently to get this leftwing ideologue elected.

And let’s be clear: the buck stops at Obama. He’s the one responsible for this partisan witch hunt, this criminalizing of political differences. If the radical left is driving the agenda, Barack Obama is still the man serving as their tool.

Update, April 27: Porter Goss – CIA director from September 2004 to May 2006, chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence from 1997 to 2004 – described himself as being “slack-jawed” over the Democrats blatantly obvious lies and demagoguery over this issue.

An article from Atlas Shrugs entitled “Obama Crossed the Line” raises the legitimate anger that should result from Obama’s actions:

If Obama commits treason, is it legal? Obama was not brought up in the USA and lacks American DNA. The fact that he was raised in the largest Muslim country in the world and that his mother was a communist and his Kenyan father was no lover of America tells us a lot about where Obama’s sympathies lie. It tells me that for Obama, it’s payback time, and payback is a bitch.

The problem with starting a process of partisan witch hunting is that it won’t stop. You can hunt conservatives down now, Obama; but just realize that you’ll be the witch next.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Millions of people jobless. Billions of dollars in bailouts. Trillions of dollars in U.S. debt. And yet, for the first time in years, more Americans than not say the country is on the right track.

In a sign that Barack Obama has inspired hopes for a brighter future in the first 100 days of his presidency, an Associated Press-GfK poll shows that 48 percent of Americans believe the United States is headed in the right direction — compared with 44 percent who disagree.

Wow. I want to bear Barack Obama’s child. And I’m a guy. And I’m not even gay. That and I’ve been in this hysterical crying jag for years. And then January 20th came, and it was as though the sun suddenly broke out “for the first time in my adult lifetime.” Or NOT. But that seems to be how the Associated Press wants us to view our new Messiah-in-chief.

Most of the papers and media sources that are carrying the story of the AP poll conveniently leave out pertinent details that would bring the tone of the story WAY down if they were given attention. Such as:

Of those who say the country is on the right track in the AP-GfK poll, 73 percent are Democrats, 17 percent are independents and 10 percent are Republicans.

I found myself wondering how Obama could have such high numbers from Democrats and such low numbers from Independents and Republicans.

Obama’s job approval rating comes in at 62 percent, down just three points from the 65 percent approval he received after his first week in office. Twenty-nine percent of Americans disapprove.

In addition, most people say Obama is doing a better job than they expected (26 percent) or meeting expectations (56 percent). Few say he is doing worse than expected (16 percent).

The president’s approval is nearly identical to the job rating George W. Bush received at the same point in his first term, as 63 percent of Americans approved and 22 percent disapproved (April 18-19, 2001). One noticeable difference is that approval of Obama is much more divided along partisan lines today than Bush’s ratings were eight years ago.

There is a wide 68 percentage point gap between the number of Democrats (92 percent) and Republicans (24 percent) who approve of the job Obama is doing. For Bush, there was a 50-point gap in April 2001.

So we find out two things: 1) Bush actually had a slightly BETTER approval rating after his first 100 days (so PLEASE stop making it sound as though Obama is the mostest popularest president ever EVER); and 2) Obama’s numbers are dramatically more partisan than were Bush’s. Basically, Democrats are going ga-ga over him, while everyone else is tepid at best.

Did I mention that only 17% of Independents believe Obama is taking the country in the right direction?

For the sake of argument, let’s say that the AP poll – which is a totally biased piece of crap – were actually accurate. My point would be that given the astonishingly liberal bias that is constantly thrust into our faces in the name of “news,” “journalism,” and “coverage,” and “analysis,” what the hell else would you expect?